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August 17, 2004

The fallacy of capitalism

A great fallacy of our time is born from the
propaganda of our economic system. Capitalism is an
intrinsically expansion seeking system that markets
itself based upon the rewards of profit and a win-win
resultant for participants. What makes this marketing
fallacious is born from the fact that the concept of
profit is an anomaly to nature’s laws and the fact
that all competition based phenomenon always produces
win-lose resultant.

People will correctly lament, in capitalism defense,
that it is the most productive economic system that
currently manifest and will use the relative poor
state of its competitors as proof. However, its
success at producing wealth is not in question. One
could go out and commit robberies to acquire income to
convert to wealth. If they succeed, one can then argue
that robbery or criminality is a successful
methodology or system of uplift. Thus, the issue is
not in regards to producing success, but rather the
net result of the activity on the humans contacted.

Capitalism is predicated and motivated by the concept
of profit. Profit is not a natural phenomenon in
nature. In fact, there never can be profit in nature
when everything is summed up. In other words, there is
“no net gain” in nature, because there are no net
gains in closed system or virtual closed systems such
as the earth, for all intents and purposes. For
everything that is gained within a closed system,
something else must be lost as the offset. This is
backed up by the first and second laws of
thermodynamics. The former is the law that says that
one can never get more energy out than energy put in.
The latter being the law that says that you cannot
even get the same degree of energy back as that which
you put in.

What happens in nature is that things “shift” from one
form to another and from one time and place to
another, but there is never a net gain after all the
reactions are summed up from the action. It is this
“shifting” that people confuse with profit and
win-win. It is confused as profit or win-win due to
the fact that the tradeoff or opposite effect is
hidden, thereby creating the impression that there are
no losers or tradeoff. In the past, the trade off was
obvious, as in the case of slavery. One group of
people lifted themselves up via putting others down,
in a form of “seesaw” economics. That becomes morally
reprehensible for a supposed Christian people. Thus, a
more hidden and clandestine manifestation of “seesaw”
economics exist today. Furthermore, many of the trade
offs are not real-time, but manifest in the future,
thus creating a win-win reality only in the context of
the present.

In essence profit is simply getting more out of an
interaction than an entity has put in, which again is
an anomaly to natures laws. Most forms of profiting
comes from the resultant of combining human energies
into a “potluck”, where the host is allowed to come
out with more than put in. The interaction is
generally between owners of capital, workers and
consumers, each providing a dish to the “potluck”, but
some consuming less than the equivalent of their
input, due to others consuming more than the
equivalent of theirs. This is accepted because each
entity voluntarily enters into these agreements of
unequal exchanges and do get something in return…just
not what they should have gotten in an equal exchange
or barter.

Our economic system is also a competition driven
phenomenon. All competition based phenomenon have the
effect of producing winners and losers. Rank and
status therefore become paramount to players in the
competitive game. Think of the NFL. The fact that
there are teams with great records is offset by the
fact that other teams have poor records. In the closed
system of the NFL, total wins must always equal total
loses. Everyone cannot go undefeated, thus, there is
no possibility mathematically that everyone can be
wealthy in terms of having more wins than loses.
Win-Win cannot exist outside of complete equality of
records, thus it is also lose-lose as much as it is
win-win because there is not separation or rank. Also,
the only way to create parity is to reduce those who
are overly wealthy in victories simultaneously
reducing those who are poor in losses.

When we look at the problems of the world today, most
are the consequence or tradeoff effect emanating from
past acts that created profit and wealth for people in
the past. Not only just in regards to colonization,
slavery, imperialism, militarism and other people
conflicts, however. Today, we are embarking upon an
ecological crisis of global warming that emanates
largely from the industrial revolution and era that
has allowed humans to live more comfortable and
creating much wealth in the process. The effect of our
human activity is mostly conserved for the future in
regards to its effect on nature and ecology. We humans
have quite possible written a check that our
descendants will not be able to cover.

In conclusion, in light of the above, things will only
get worse in this world from the spread of capitalism
as it manifest in the USA and the USA has begun its
descent from its zenith as capital seeks the path of
least resistance, which is cheap labor cost. Thus, the
USA success and high wages has become its course and
the nation are about to become the victims of itself.

The fallacy of capitalism is something that only few are willing to accept as reality. The struggle to get this message out is rife with doubters who cannot see past the nike clothes they are wearing. Unfortunately the majority of the yonger generation (of which i am incuded) are so caught up in this system they cannot comprehend the negative aspects of a capitalist society. By the means of the media and a corrupt education system the real benefactors remain in power ready to dictate to us every aspect of our lives. The only way we can escape this world of artificial truths is to free our minds. The greatest wepon used is fear against man. Ask yourself: Why are we afraid of a positive balance? What influences your opinion? When was the last time you really saw the world for what it is? Why do you want to doubt the truth?

Thank you for this essay it is a comfort to know others have their third eye open

a very succinct analysis indeed.... It fails to dawn upon our society that profit and capital are exclusively human concepts. We should remember that as humans, our functioning as organisms in the ecosystem is no different from that of any single-celled organism insofar as maintaining the balance of ecosystem is concerned. No matter how cerebrally superior we might be to other living beings